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The heavy fog rolled in from nowhere. The sky had been perfectly bright and blue, but I just left for a moment and returned to find everything covered by impenetrable greenish-teal mist. We frequently got fog from the lakes in the area, but this was not natural. It felt like I had wandered into another world. I saw lights in the distance, floating by my house and the trees. They reminded me of lightning bugs, but even the smallest were at least the size of a baseball. I approached, and some of them paused, hovering in mid-air. For some reason, this gave me the thought that they were curious about me. Abruptly, they scattered and I became aware of the sound of water sloshing and splashing. The fog began to clear a little and I pulled back as I saw a gargantuan shadow rearing back, frighteningly close.

As the fog continued to dissipate I recognized the shape to be the new girl I had invited, grown to the size of a house. She was kneeling in the dirt, holding our swimming pool up like she was some kind of viking drinking from a massive bowl of soup. Her gut was stretched near to bursting, and I thought I could hear her skin stretching, groaning like the hull of a ship. As I watched, she discarded the pool like a cheap plate and it splintered on the ground with a booming crack that made me jump. The water began to pool and turn to mud around her knees and my feet as I realized all of the other guests were missing. I looked stupidly at the wreckage of the pool, wondering why I couldn't see any people. I looked back up at her and started backwards as I looked into her eyes for the first time.

She had always had strange eyes; when I first met her in school they had been a bright shade of purple, but I just thought she wore contacts. She had lavender-dyed hair and always wore extravagant clothing and jewelry, so it made sense that she would wear something that strange like that. But now I was looking into two huge gleaming black orbs, filled with spiraling deep purple-blue clouds that swirled with bright stars and haunted lights, glittering waters and the night sky. I felt a dark pressure at the sides of my skull. I was looking into infinity. I was looking down into a galaxy that swirled and coiled endlessly, uncaring if anything lived or died. My hypnosis was sharply broken when she gave me a sweet, sheepish smile that squinted those terrible eyes.

"Sorry, I didn't mean to break your giant bowl-thing."

I stood blinking at her in complete blank confusion. She bit her lip as her smile became more awkward, and shrugged one shoulder, looking away. That finally got through my head that I was actually looking at her and not some kind of hallucination.

From what little I knew about her, she had always been kind of weird and awkward. A few of my friends had wondered why I even invited her. No one else really knew her; She was new at school, she never really talked to anyone and she spent most of her time alone. She had been alone when I approached her for the first time in the cafeteria. She was sitting there by herself, eating nothing, staring off into nowhere. I thought I would be nice to her and invite her to the party at my house. Maybe she could make some friends or something. But now...

Two people stepped tentatively out onto the porch, and before they could react she reached back and grabbed them in one massive hand. She began to raise them towards her open mouth.

Now I regretted ever inviting that weird quiet girl.

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Color request for Patreon. Originally a Patreon line request, viewable here: https://aryion.com/g4/view/382372

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